UK’s Q4 2013 GDP In Line With Previous Estimates Of 0.7%; GDP Grew At 0.8% In Q3 2013

Smiling Union Jack piggy banks are lined up for sale in the window of a souvenir store on Oxford Street in central London on Jan. 20, 2014.
Reuters/Andrew Winning

Quarterly growth in the U.K.’s gross domestic product, or GDP, was in line with the last two estimates, and grew at 0.7 percent in the last quarter of 2013, data from the Office for National Statistics showed Friday.

GDP in the previous quarter grew at 0.8 percent, according to the ONS, which noted that despite a strong showing in the previous two quarters, growth remained 1.4 percent below its peak rate seen in the first quarter of 2008 before the financial crisis, ONS reported.

“Growth in the services industries remained the strongest contributor,” ONS reported, increasing by 0.8 percent in Q4, while the manufacturing sector too contributed positively to GDP, growing by 0.5 percent. However, output in the construction sector contracted by 0.2 percent.

In the previous two estimates -- one in January and another in February -- GDP was estimated to have grown by 0.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2013 over the previous quarter.

Employee compensation, which includes wages and salaries, pension and other employers’ contributions, grew for the 13th straight quarter, ONS reported, while the level of employment and total weekly hours were both reported to be above their pre-downturn peaks.